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Like most instructors, I have graded more papers than I care to count. Add to this the drafts and proposals that I have reviewed and the number gets all together more daunting. Something was a bit different this term, though. I saw more issues with plagiarism or “almost” plagiarism. I was reminded about how it is easy to do the research, but writing is a special craft that the students have to learn. I tell students each term their writing will improve.

Wait until you hear what advertisers support the collegeACB site. Below is the better part of an email I received from the father of one of the students at Cornell who has taken action by going after the advertisers. I suspect you will be as shocked as I was to read his message, below in italics.My wife and I decided to look at the College ACB website to see who the advertisers are. It was surprising to see the following sponsors:-United Way-American Heart Association-Big Brothers Big Sisters

While environmental unsustainability might take a while to affect lifestyles in North America, economic unsustainability won't be so slow. In fact, it's affecting all of us right now (whether we want to acknowledge that fact or not).

We are in the process of preparing our next five year plan which will cover the years 2012-2017. Our previous plan focused on providing additional resources to enhance the academic profile of the University and very substantial progress was made in enhancing undergraduate student quality as well as adding additional faculty lines and other resources. This new plan will again have an academic orientation but not the luxury of focusing just on what we would like to add.

As I described here a few weeks ago, I am recovering from a cracked rib thanks to an overenthusiastic hug from my suddenly gigantic son. Generally, I'm a pretty enthusiastic hugger myself, so I've found I now have to warn friends not to embrace me when I meet them on the street.

Since the draft of Outline of China’s National Plan for Medium and Long-Term Education Reform and Development (2010-2020) released in February 2010 by the Ministry of Education for public discussion, de-bureaucratization within institutions of higher education (gaoxiao qu xingzhenghua) has been a hot issue of debate. Colleges and universities have been objects of fierce public criticism from scholars, students, government, and other stakeholders. Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao opposed bureaucratization within higher education institutions.

The EDUCAUSE CIO list service recently featured a question that asked, “What is a good policy?” Excellent responses ensued; I offer my version not as a CIO but as the lieutenant of one, and as more of a story informed by experience than a handbook on policy. The story is so long -- going on ten years now, that I, like Dickens, will tell it as a serial. Here is my first installment: Framework.Framework

Achieving the Dream is an initiative sponsored by the Lumina Foundation and spearheaded by one of my personal heroes, Kay McClenney. It’s an attempt to get community colleges across the country to build ‘cultures of evidence’ about student success. It relies heavily on data-driven decisionmaking, with the goal of prodding colleges to move from the ways things have always been done to the ways that things actually succeed. It’s a great idea, and I’m a fan. (For the record, my college is not an ATD school.)

I've been teaching a seminar course for several years now designed for students who may be headed to grad school or who simply want to know more about the ins and outs of research. It meets once a week for a couple of hours and many students can fit it into their schedules without having to sacrifice another course or pay an overload.

Almost a year ago, I decided to start blogging and got on Twitter. A few months after that, I responded to a call for submissions from the University of Venus. The collaboration with the writers I’ve met and interacted with online has been amazing. Writing about issues in higher education that I care about has been incredibly liberating and empowering.